5th Gen New title

King Gumball said:

I will always call them legendaries... It seems weird to change it now. Mythical makes a lot of sense, more sense actually but I have grown up with legendary so that is what I will call them.

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This. Exactly. It'd be too hard to change how I refer to legendaries now. ):

ALTHOUGH, maybe I can argue with this one kid I ran into the other day who was ranting about how they're making legendaries too common; mythical gives the impression that they're rare, but there can be more of them, so there? (:

I like the sound of "mythical Pokemon", but I'm so use to legendary that there's a good chance I'll keep calling them that. :P

I guess it depends on the Pokemon. To me, legendary sounds like a one-of-a-kind Pokemon that went down in history, while mythical sounds more elusive, with only a possibility of whether or not it actually exists. Legendary is much more epic sounding, while mythical is much more mysterious.

I kind of like mythical better, but I've been calling them legendaries for so long that it would be hard to stop now.

I like Mythical better but Mythicals doesn't sound right xD How about Mythics?

Hmm .... seems ok
But i'd only use it for less important legendaries
like mew,mewtwo,celebi,latios,latias,jirachi,manapy,victini
Those have no purpose to be honest they are there for you pleasure
but the important ones like the Trios or The games main pokemon are deffentaly legendary :P

I like the word Mythical but I always refer to them as Legendaries lol :)

Yeah, no. They're still legendary to me.

Mythical doesn't really apply to all Legendary Pokemon. And regardless, I've referred to them as Legendary all my life, so I could care less that after so many years they were renamed to something else.

This actually comes from the distinction between different kinds of legendaries in Japanese. "Mythical Pokémon" are a subset of "legendary Pokémon" apparently containing Mew, Celebi, Jirachi, Deoxys, Phione, Manaphy, Darkrai, Shaymin, Arceus, Victini, Keldeo, Meloetta, and Genesect (the event legendaries.) It is not clear whether the term applies to Regigigas, Zorua, or Zoroark considering the methods of obtaining them and the fact the Z's are not legendaries.

"Mythical Pokémon" is not a renaming of "legendary Pokémon" considering Reshiram and Zekrom are referred to as legendary. Also, the beasts/dogs/cats/hamsters/whatever were referred to as legendary in the English dub of movie 13. The title of this thread may need to be changed.

Sydian said:

"Mythicals" doesn't have as much of a ring as "legendaries." Plus it's not even a word. Does that make my opinion of the change obvious? Heh.

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Exactly, the change makes "mythical Pokemon" seem even weirder. :cer_laugh:

MrGriszell said:

While in English, all are typically grouped under the banner of "legendary", there are three distinct terms in Japanese that are used to refer to them. One, 伝説のポケモン densetsu no Pokémon, literally "legendary Pokémon", refers to Pokémon such as Kyogre and Groudon, who are featured prominently in the legends of the Pokémon world. A second, 幻のポケモン maboroshi no Pokémon, literally "illusory Pokémon", refers to Pokémon seen so rarely, such as Mew, that some question their very existence. This term was translated in the Generation IV games as "mirage Pokémon", in reference to the various myths of Sinnoh, and many consider it to refer to Pokémon that are restricted to Nintendo events, not available during the course of normal gameplay. The third and newest term is 神話のポケモン shinwa no Pokémon, literally "mythical Pokémon", which refers to the Pokémon which are spoken of as the creators of the Sinnoh region.

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bwburke94 said:

This actually comes from the distinction between different kinds of legendaries in Japanese. "Mythical Pokémon" are a subset of "legendary Pokémon" apparently containing Mew, Celebi, Jirachi, Deoxys, Phione, Manaphy, Darkrai, Shaymin, Arceus, Victini, Keldeo, Meloetta, and Genesect (the event legendaries.) It is not clear whether the term applies to Regigigas, Zorua, or Zoroark considering the methods of obtaining them and the fact the Z's are not legendaries.

"Mythical Pokémon" is not a renaming of "legendary Pokémon" considering Reshiram and Zekrom are referred to as legendary. Also, the beasts/dogs/cats/hamsters/whatever were referred to as legendary in the English dub of movie 13.

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I've come across the informational content of the above 2 posts on Bulbapedia...

Mirage/Illusory Pokemon: The term sounds cool, except that we already have the label of winged mirages for the Legendary Birds, and those things are as common as heck. They're available in nine different games - ten if Japan's Pokemon Green Version is counted.

Mythical Pokemon: I really don't see what makes the "Sinnoh" legends so special for them to gain their own classification. Some of the Sinnoh legendaries might be justified due to the fact that they technically aren't of Sinnoh, being absent from Sinnoh's regional PokeDex listing, but I have some problems with that listing anyway (Phione isn't more special than Manaphy!). And it's stupid that the term is essentially synonymous with "event" Pokemon, an annoying concept in itself.

trevman727 said:

Yeah, no. They're still legendary to me.

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This. Legendary Pokemon is a much better term, IMO. Mythical Pokemon makes it seem like any Pokemon classified as this is a fake and isn't a genuine Pokemon. While Legendary Pokemon partially implies the same thing, it could also be construed as meaning that any Pokemon classified as legendary is so strong/powerful, it has become known via repeated storytellings, with the actual veracity of the Pokemon's existence being debatable. There is really no reason to rename Legendaries at this point.

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If any division must be made to categorize Legendary Pokemon, a better one IMO would be:

Illusory* Pokemon: "cute"-but-rarely-seen Pokemon
Cute: Mew, Celebi, Jirachi, Manaphy, Shaymin, and Victini.

Possibly Mewtwo, Mewtwo/Lucario-esque, and Lati@s-esque Pokemon: Mewtwo, Arcanine, Latios, Latias, Lucario, Cresselia, Darkrai, Zorua/Zoroark, Genesect, whichever Gen 5 Pokemon that are Lati@s-esque.

I dislike the term illusory though because "illusions" are more of an optical, physical phenomena rather than the description of appearance rate or recurrence.

Mythical Pokemon: the "big titan" and the "trio" Pokemon
Trios: Moltres, Articuno, Zapdos, Entei, Suicune, Raikou, Regirock, Registeel, Regice, Azelf, Mesprit, Uxle, musketeer trio, kami trio

Titans: (Lugia, Ho-oh, Groudon, Kyogre, Rayquaza, Dialga, Palkia, Giratina, Regigigas, Heatran, Reshiram, Zekrom, Kyuremu, Stalyumi, Amaress).
These ones are the ones primarily featured in tales/"myths" and are mainly involved in "creating" the Pokemon world...

Personally, I believe that legendary categorization sort of gets murky at times, with my own subgroups being "big titan" legendaries, "trio" legendaries, "cute" legendaries, "Mewtwo/Lucario-ish" legendaries, and "Lati@s-ish" legendaries.

In all honesty, Nintendo and Game Freak, just call all of them legendary Pokemon/legendaries and be done with it. Categorizing them due to a certain game mechanic is just stupid and doesn't have any bearing or explanation "in-universe". Terms like "illusory", "mythical", and "mirage" will likely only serve to complicate matters in an already convoluted Pokemon world. >_>

trevman727 said:

Yeah, no. They're still legendary to me.

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I was about to post this exact message, but since it would now be considered spam, I'll go with "They were obviously drunk, and I will just ignore them." They have always been Legendaries, and they will always be.

Magmaruby and Aquasapphire said:

Lol the funny thing is that they were never really changed as Legendary was mostly a fan used term for the powerful rare pokemon in the games...

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Please explain Ho-oh, Lugia, Entei and Raikou, Raikou and Suicune, Suicune and Entei, Rayquaza and Deoxys, Darkrai and Cresselia, Kyogre and Groudon and Dialga and Palkia LEGEND to me ;)

The only thing I don't get is why they changed the term :S

The problem with the use of "mirage Pokémon" is that it already refers to something different in the anime. So separating them into "mythical" (Mew, Celebi, etc.) and other legendaries (the birds, the beasts, etc.) is better. Still, as I said, "mythical" is a subset.

I thought Mythical Pokemon only applied to the legendaries not normally envountered in the game (Arceus, Deoxys, Genesect, Melotta, Shaymin, Mew etc...) or was that Phantom Pokemon?

Is there even a link to an official source that says they are changing the title? I watched the English Version of Black and White "Enter Iris and Axew" and they definatly called Zekrom a "Legendary" Pokemon and even Team Rocket said they'd catch all of Unova's "Legendary" Pokemon.

インフェルノの津波 said:

Are you kidding me? Legendary means debatable, not seen, extremely powerful! Look at what most can do!

Dialga can distort and CONTROL time. What?!
Giratina is in control over THE OTHER DIMENSION/WORLD.

Look. I can tolerate somethings, but they're legendary for a reason, people!]

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And many myths, especially those in well-known Greek and Egyptian Mythologies revolve around great deities whom wield immense power, even creating and destroying life at will. The difference between the two words does not really mean much.

Hey, let's take Dialga for an example.

The Pokédex said:

It has the power to control time. It appears in Sinnoh-region myths as an ancient deity.

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Sounds like a Mythical Pokémon to me

The 100 Mega Shock said:

And many myths, especially those in well-known Greek and Egyptian Mythologies revolve around great [S-HIGHLIGHT]dirties[/S-HIGHLIGHT] whom wield immense power

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Great dirties, indeed. :cer_laugh:

I prefer Legendary Pokemon, as there's really no point for the rename. And, IMO, mythical has a negative connotation of the mythical being in question being fake or nonexistent. Those Greek and Egyptian whatevs are fake. Legendary is a better term because it's as if the legendary being's abilities are so great, stories have been developed to challenge the veracity of such abilities.


Is Dialga fake? ;)

That's more of a colloquial meaning of the word "myth"

In this context there is no falsehood implied - especially when we're talking about the Pokémon world where crazy **** happens every week.